


back when our world was one block wide

by helsinkibaby



Category: Glee
Genre: Backstory, Community: cottoncandy_bingo, F/M, Future Fic, Het, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-16
Updated: 2014-07-16
Packaged: 2018-02-09 04:19:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,312
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1968795
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/helsinkibaby/pseuds/helsinkibaby
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rachel and Puck, through the years.</p>
            </blockquote>





	back when our world was one block wide

**Author's Note:**

> Title taken from "Mary's Song" by Taylor Swift  
> Written for the "childhood sweethearts" square on my Cotton Candy Bingo Card

When Noah Puckerman meets Rachel Berry for the first time, they are in kindergarten. She's wearing a yellow sweater, short check skirt, white knee high socks and patent leather shoes. The band in her hair has a little yellow polka dotted bow on it and she's standing beside the teacher's desk like she wants to run the place. Of course, she does want to run the place which Puck, all spiked hair and attitude, does not take kindly to and he wastes no time in telling her so. 

Of course, Rachel Berry doesn't take that lying down and gives as good as she gets, which earns the grudging respect of a pint sized badass. 

By the end of the first week they're the best of friends and Puck's mom is joking about her son's first girlfriend. She's not joking, however, when she gets called to the school because Puck's in trouble for punching Jimmy McCarthy. Puck won't apologise though, because Jimmy made fun of Rachel for having two dads and made her cry, and no one makes Puck's best friend cry. 

His mom apologises to the teacher but buys Puck an ice cream on the way home. 

*

The friendship lasts through kindergarten but not much beyond that and by the time they're in middle school, Puck has all but forgotten about the girl he used to know. The first time he sees her in high school though, the memories come back to him with a vengeance. 

She's standing in the middle of the hallway, smiling, looking like she wants to run the place. The band in her hair has a little yellow polka dotted bow on it, and she's wearing a yellow sweater, a short check skirt with white knee high socks and patent leather shoes. 

She smiles differently when she sees him coming, like she recognises him, is happy to see him.

She never sees the slushy coming. 

He remembers when Jimmy McCarthy made her cry all those years ago, just like he's made her cry now and the look on her face, in her eyes, stays with him long after his friends stop slapping him on the back.

*

Sophomore year brings quite a few surprises for Puck, because if you'd predicted that he was going to join the Glee Club, he would have been looking for the men in white coats right behind you. 

But join he does, and what's even more of a surprise is that he actually enjoys it, finds something that he's good at besides beating people up and playing football. He ends up becoming friends with Rachel again, even ends up dating her for all of five minutes before he realises that she's never going to be anything other than hung up over Finn. He tells himself that those two are meant to be, that he and Rachel would never have made it anyway - he's too much of a screw up for her, she's way too high maintenance for him. 

Just sometimes though, like when he's in the middle of a flash mob at the mall, dancing with her to "Barbra Streisand" of all things, when she's laughing and smiling and singing and looking so god-damn amazing that he can hardly take it....

Well, sometimes, he wonders. 

*

He wonders but he doesn't act on it, because she's Finn's girl, even when she's not and by the end of senior year, they're very much a couple. Unlike most of Lima, Puck's not surprised when Rachel goes off to New York on her own, because he'd figured Finn was all about the noble shit and stuff. He heads to California, keeps in touch with some people from McKinley but not that many. 

Then the phone call comes that changes the world. 

He can't believe it, doesn't want to believe it, but when he's back home in Lima, sees the grief stricken look on everyone's faces, feels how his mom holds him just a little bit tighter, he can't deny it. He sings for Finn, just like the rest of Glee Club, but his song is nothing compared to Rachel's. Grief is etched all over her face and he doesn't know how she holds it together. 

He goes to see her, before he leaves, or at least that's his intention. He sits outside the house on his bike but he doesn't go in. 

He intends to write to her when he knows where he's at, but he never does. 

*

The next time he sees Rachel Berry, she is a bona fide Broadway star. He calls to the stage door, tells the man mountain who answers his knock that he's an old friend, even unearths an ancient Glee Club photograph that he'd found at his mom's house during his last visit home. Man Mountain looks suspicious to say the least but he tells Puck that he'll let Rachel know he's there. 

He's gone a long time, so long that Puck starts to think that he's actually gone to call the cops, like he's some crazy stalker or something and he turns on his heel and begins to walk away because he's been free from the long arm of the law for years now and he'd actually like to keep it that way. He figures he can come back later, surprise her after the show and he's wondering what he can do in the meantime when he hears her voice calling him. 

"Noah?"

It's a question as well as a greeting and he turns, gives her his best smile. Her reaction isn't what he's expecting; her eyes get wide, her jaw drops open and her hands fly up to cover her open mouth. Which does nothing to disguise the shakes of her shoulders, and while some people might think that she's crying, Puck can hear her laughter perfectly well. 

"What, all these years and I get laughter? Nice, Berry, real nice." Except that he's smiling when he says it and walking towards her. After all, she's not the first person with that reaction; he doubts she'll be the last. 

"They told me someone was here to see me..." she manages to get out. "But they thought you were a stripper." That sets her off into another peal of giggles and he shrugs, looks down at his dress whites. 

"I can strip if you want me to," he tells her with a leer, the old Puck making a teasing and temporary appearance. "But the uniform's the real thing."

She nods, suddenly serious. "I know... my dads told me, they still see your mom at Temple." She shakes her head, tears suddenly shining bright in her eyes and this is not what he wanted, to make her cry, not what he wanted at all. "I'm so proud of you, Noah."

She's not just speaking for herself, he knows, and that knowledge puts a lump in his throat that he has to swallow hard to force back down. "Says the Broadway star." He's surprised at how steady his voice is. "Pretty awesome, Rach."

She smiles at him, a smile he remembers from high school, from kindergarten, from his whole life and then he can't see that smile any more because her arms are around his neck and she's holding him tightly. His arms go around her waist and he holds her just as tightly and it's like he's found something he didn't even know he was missing. 

*

He wears his dress whites again at the Temple in Lima when he marries her, when once again tears stand in her eyes as she looks at him. Her dads smile in the front row and his mom cries and he knows she's remembering all those jokes about them being childhood sweethearts. 

It makes a nice story, even if it's not entirely true, but Puck's not interested in their past. 

Not when their future looks so bright.


End file.
